


Making the Right Choices

by sniperct



Category: Frozen (Disney Movies)
Genre: Angst, Anna is 12, Elsa is 15, Gen, Heartbreaking, Light and Love 2020, Pre-Frozen (2013), This Is Sad, snow sisters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-17
Updated: 2020-12-17
Packaged: 2021-03-11 00:47:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,416
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28136436
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sniperct/pseuds/sniperct
Summary: Some nights Elsa wanders the halls of the castle, haunting it like a ghost. Unable to sleep, she finds Anna in the courtyard building a snowman.For just a brief moment Elsa almost forgets herself.Almost.
Relationships: Anna & Elsa (Disney)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 29





	Making the Right Choices

**Author's Note:**

> For Light and Love 2020
> 
> Do You Want To Build A Snowman?

It was very late, the staff all asleep and the lights all put out, but Elsa was unable to sleep. She lay in bed staring at the ceiling, lost in her own head. 

Her sixteenth birthday was coming soon, and with it came the official tradition of being made Crown Princess. She was already the heir, but this somehow made it more official. Or something. She immersed herself in matters of state, the laws of Arendelle and all the traditions of her country, but just because she knew how it worked didn’t mean she always understood the whys. Even her father had just told her that it was the way it always had been.

Maybe they should ask why it had always been so, rather than just accepting it, but she had enough problems to deal with without upending centuries of tradition.

Naturally, the thought filled her with anxiety, though not as much as it could have. After all, by the time she became Queen, she’d be in her forties at least. So there was still plenty of time to find a solution to her powers, plenty of time to practice hiding them. But that also meant there was plenty of time for people to discover her secret.

Well, now she wasn’t going to be getting back to sleep any time soon.

Groaning, she slipped out of bed, pulling on her gloves before she tiptoed across her room to her door and peeked into the hallway. There was no one there, so she stepped out and started to walk down the hall. Sometimes she felt like a ghost haunting the castle, but it was one of the few times of day she felt comfortable leaving her room. No one to talk to, no one to see her. Even if she did sometimes miss the sunlight on her skin and those summer days of play.

There was a sound that drew her attention and she paused next to a window. Elsa could see movement outside in the courtyard, a figure bustling about and humming softly in the pre-dawn light. She almost turned around but something like an ache in her heart made her move to the nearby doorway and step outside.

She could make out Anna in the moonlight, moving around, bouncing a little and humming a cheery tune. Unsure what it was her sister was doing, Elsa snuck closer, hiding behind a tree.

Anna was building a snowman.

Elsa’s vision blurred, and she blinked her eyes to dry them, pressing a hand against her chest. _Conceal, don’t feel._ The mantra repeated itself in her head until she was able to clamp down on her emotions, a glittering stripe of ice running up the trunk of the tree.

But it stopped, and she took a breath and stepped out until she was in view of Anna.

_I love you,_ she meant to say, feeling it as strongly as she ever had. What she said was, “What are you doing out here?”

Anna jumped, dropping the large ball of snow she was building. It broke apart into a sad mess when it hit the ground, “Elsa! Hi. Uhm. I couldn’t sleep. What are _you_ doing?”

Her sister was gangly, all limbs in a way that Elsa had finally grown out of. It was cute, and she wished she could… Wished she could allow herself the moments she wanted to tease and joke about it with her. Wringing her hands together, heart racing, Elsa shook her head, “I couldn’t sleep either. Do you always build a snowman when you can’t sleep?”

“Yeah. Kind of weird, huh?” Anna folded her arms, hopeful eyes darting over Elsa’s face, “Do you want to build one with me…?”

“Not really that weird,” Elsa said, taking a step towards the half-built snowman. Towards Anna. To help her put together something like they had all those years ago. But she stopped herself, fearing what could happen if something went wrong. Her Ice. Ice so cold it burned, so cold it would hurt Anna. Like a flash she remembered Anna laying there on the ground.

And the warmth, the warmth that Anna made her feel, the warmth that had started to show on her face, it drained away.

No. She’d _never_ allow that to happen again. Her expression smoothed over, she subconsciously straightened herself and squared her shoulders, walls of ice slamming down around her and encasing her heart as she resembled the Queen that was supposed to be her destiny and yet had never truly felt.

Pulling her shawl — their mother’s, Elsa realized — closer, Anna seemed to hunch over, her face falling, heart breaking, brittle and frail.

“You should go inside,” Elsa said, the coldness in her voice shocking even to her.

Eyes glistening, Anna just nodded and sniffled. Elsa took a quick step back as she passed, nearly panicking out of fear Anna would try to touch her. But she didn’t, and the door clicked shut so quietly that Elsa almost didn’t hear it. 

Slamming would have been preferable.

The walls inside her shattered as if that sound were a thunderclap. Elsa covered her mouth to stifle a pained half-choked sob, blinking her eyes again as something sharp and agonizing ripped through her chest. She swallowed a second sob, and a third. The ground at her feet froze solid, tears freezing to her cheeks and she repeated her mantra a hundred times over before she was able to regain control.

And even then Elsa needed a few minutes, hands shaking, before she felt like it was safe to move. It was just so much safer to keep it in than to let it out.

She looked at the snowman. His body had been built and Anna had been in the process of placing his head, which now stared at her in smashed judgment. All Elsa ever did was make things worse and there were days she wondered if it might not be better for Anna and her parents if she ran away; or if she’d never been born. But the thought of running away was terrifying, and the last thing she wanted was to disappoint her family like that. Elsa had duties, and responsibility she could never run away from. So here she stayed, trapped as surely as if there were shackles around her legs.

Kneeling, Elsa gathered up the snow, patting it into as good a shape as she could manage without her powers. Then, carefully, she lifted it up and positioned it on top of the snowman’s body. Thinking of all the presents that Anna would slip under her door, she added two sticks for arms and some twigs for hair and he was almost complete. She stared at him, tapping her finger against her chin as she tried to figure out what was missing.

Oh!

Elsa slipped back inside, making a beeline for the kitchen, feeling excited for the first time in forever. Once she had what she needed, she returned to the courtyard, a certain kind of giddy to her steps.

“A carrot for a nose,” she whispered. “And coal for eyes and now you’re complete.”

The excitement abated in the silence, as she and the snowman stared at each other, companions in a moment when Elsa had none.

“Hello Olaf, do you still like warm hugs?”

_I love you, Olaf!_ Anna’s voice rang in her head, and Elsa brought her hand to her face, pressing it against her eyes. A snowman for Anna. She did _everything_ for Anna. Elsa couldn’t even say what her own wants and needs were and if there were voices out there calling she wasn’t able to listen. Not for the first time, nor the last, Elsa felt like she didn’t belong.

But even if it meant no warm hugs and barely speaking, everything Elsa did was for her sister. Every sacrifice. It was worth it. It _had_ to be. 

Wrapping her arms around herself, Elsa walked back inside, leaving Olaf behind for Anna to hopefully find in the morning; the closest thing to an apology she could manage.

She barely made it to her room before it was too much, and Elsa dropped to her knees as she started to cry. Ice grew from where she knelt, spreading faster and faster as her sobbing overwhelmed her. The ice only proved she was doing the right, making the right choices for Anna. For her parents and the Kingdom. But mostly for Anna.

_Always_ for Anna.


End file.
